


Fe + Au

by nhixxie



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-09
Updated: 2014-07-09
Packaged: 2018-02-08 05:00:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1927536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nhixxie/pseuds/nhixxie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mickey Milkovich is iron; Ian Gallagher is gold—and no blacksmith sees the practicality of mixing something beautifully pure with something so repeatedly tarnished. So Mickey Milkovich stays away, and Mickey Milkovich lets himself rust.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fe + Au

**Author's Note:**

> Occurs post 4x12, but reaches out to the bulk of Ian and Mickey's relationship from season three; an attempt to to tie the loose ends left by the season finale.

Every Milkovich is iron.

It is what sits in their veins, makes up their blood—it’s what reinforces their bones and lets them breathe. They curl their fingers around guns and knives because they are metallic in their composition and weaponry sings to them in ways other modes of persuasion do not. Fire burns in their household in the form of their father, the patriarch—and every reeling roar and raised fist are the embers that spray in the air every time the flames grow too strong. All of them are molten liquid under the heat, silent and moldable—and no one is as malleable as Mickey is.  

By the time Mickey Milkovich is seventeen, he’s been casted and hammered so many times he does not know who he is anymore. Instead of showing sympathy, he self-preserves. Instead of touching boys softly, he beats them down. He decides he is a hammer, because it inflicts the pain as opposed to receives it, thinks this is the only way iron should exist—hardened, rough, and strong.

So he breaks bones, spills blood, and breaks all the hearts he could manage.

“You love me.” Ian Gallagher breathes out shakily, “And you’re gay.”

Mickey sends him reeling onto the gravel, because it’s the only thing he thinks he could do. He is a hammer—he is heavy for a reason, no matter the purpose behind the force. He bites the inside of his cheek so he doesn’t cry, bunches up his fingers into fists so he doesn’t let himself touch anything of this boy who’s already bending him at his core.

Mickey Milkovich is iron,

And he already feels himself rust.

  
  
  
  


Ian Gallagher is gold.

Ian Gallagher does not rust, Ian Gallagher does not succumb to force, and Ian Gallagher does not corrode. Ian Gallagher is malleable almost to a fault, could tell the world he’s gay and not care—and Mickey Milkovich wonders how that sort of happiness feels as it settles into someone’s chest.

Hands clamour for the littlest pieces of him, fingers dipping into cold, rushing water in hopes of finding the metallic yellow amongst the dull stone. He is pristine despite his irregularities; he glistens under the sun—and when you have gold in your hands, you know you have something of value.

A gram of gold can be beaten down into a sheet of a square meter, and it will not break. Mickey Milkovich is the hammer that delivers every single blow. He tells himself he doesn’t care, beats him to the ground, trusts in Ian’s composition so much that he marries Svetlana to escape the roaring fire of his father. He wonders just how much Ian could take before he shatters under his fingers.

“Don’t,” Mickey lets himself say, the word quivering and breathless, and he can’t even look.

Ian looks back, barely. “Don’t what?”

Mickey doesn’t say anything else.

He could almost see the cracks on Ian’s surface.

  
  
  
  


Ian Gallagher is gold, Mickey Milkovich is iron, and no blacksmith sees the practicality of mixing something beautifully pure with something so repeatedly tarnished.

Mickey Milkovich stays away and tries to tell himself it doesn’t matter if he sees flashes of red in every corner he sees. He tries for any other variety of the color, fucks a prostitute in a back lane whose hair is too fiery to ever be a natural shade, hooks up with another in a washroom at the Alibi whose ginger is so much closer to red than it is to the soft orange he’s unconsciously looking for. They’re all just variations of red, and none of them are gold.

When Lip Gallagher asks him where his brother was, the iron in him shudders into life, and immediately he hardens with anger. When Mandy steals his cigarette from his lips and leaves with an angry ultimatum, he digs his fingers against his closed eyes, brows furrowed in distress.

There is no practicality in mixing gold with iron.

Mickey looks back into the decisions that brought him to this point of solitary anger—where he’s reduced to jerking off in the bathroom with a slightly crumpled photo propped against the mirror, where he’s longing for someone he himself turned away from. He realizes that every single one of them were made with the intent to desperately keep Ian Gallagher out, and there is nothing but frustration and loneliness left in the wake of his absence.

So Mickey Milkovich glares up at the red and blue strobe lights that sweeps through the club.

Mickey lifts Ian off a beaten sidewalk.

Mickey watches painfully as Ian slumbers on his bed.

Mickey brings Ian home.

 _Fuck practicality_ , he thinks. They’re all just elements on a measly table, and that’s all they’re ever going to be.

He folds every bit of Ian back into the crevices of his life.

  
  
  
  


What Mickey does not understand is that iron is strong, but up only until the point that it can resist.

If gold can withstand being thinned to transparency, iron does not have the same luxury. Iron is steadfast, yet it is brittle with just the right force and temperature. For someone like Mickey Milkovich who sees his worth through the sharpness of his tongue and composition of his fists, to be both strong and weak at the same time is the greatest piece of fucking irony in the world.

The right force and right temperature comes in the form of Ian Gallagher, and Mickey knew this from the very moment he barged into his room with a tire iron in hand.

He bangs his palms onto the counter. “Can I have your attention!”

Ian looks at him like there is nothing but this little bar, this little dirty southside neighborhood, this one city in the entire United States that is alive right now. As if everything else has skidded into a maddening stop, and it’s only Mickey—brittle, breaking iron Mickey—who is existing in motion.

“I just want everybody here to know,” he yells over the stark silence, “I’m fucking gay.”

He knows his voice would shake if he didn’t feel so damn angry over the prospect of losing Ian a second time. “Big ol’ ‘mo.” he says. _There you go._

Terry, of course, beats the shit out of him. This time, Mickey fights back.

They both sit on a couple of benches outside the Alibi, two bloodied teenagers with broken ribs and bruised hearts, and Mickey wonders why he feels so shattered yet so strong.

Ian smiles at him softly and kisses his head, and with no preamble, his question is answered.

  
  
  
  


Bipolar Disorder.

Mickey Milkovich is surprised how much he doesn’t give a shit.

He stays with Ian Gallagher like there’s nothing else he’d rather do.

Good and steady, like the iron he is—he stays.

  
  
  


 

Lip Gallagher sits in Mickey Milkovich’s dining room, fingers drumming a gentle beat against the table surface, and Mickey looks at him irritably. He raises his hand in apology and busies it by rummaging through his bag for his pack of smokes.

“You know he’s gotta get some help.” He mumbles against the cigarette between his lips.

Mickey turns to him, already angry before he even starts. “Did I fucking stutter? Did I not tell every single one of you that he’s not gonna fucking spend his life in a straight jacket?”

Lip visibly fights the urge to roll his eyes and takes a drag instead. “He just needs to be seen by a doctor. For meds, Mickey. He needs meds.”

“He can’t be bothered to roll off the bed, how the fuck are we supposed to get him to a clinic halfway into the city?” Mickey asks, but he doesn’t sound harsh, only tired and worried.

“We bring the doctor to him, then.” Lip says, cautious. “We can always ask Ned.”

“The fuck does he know about bipolar disease.” Mickey mumbles under his breath.

Ned Lishman is a surgeon, not a psychiatrist, and Lip sees the merit in the distrust. “He may know someone who does.”

Mickey’s brow furrows and he presses his lips together so tight it blanches. Lip looks at him, flicks him a cigarette, and slides the lighter across the table.

“I’ll talk to him.” Lip hears Mickey say, soft and silent, his eyes lost on the checkered pattern of the table cloth. “Let me talk to him.” he says again, as if to correct himself.

Lip sighs a small sigh, takes another drag from his cigarette, and watches dully as the smoke hangs in the air around them. He looks at the untouched cigarette still sitting on the table. With one heaving breath he stands up, hooks a couple of fingers into the hood of his jacket, and shrugs it on.

He turns to Mickey before opening the door.

“No fag bashing.” he says.

Mickey smirks a little, humored by the words.

The door snaps shut.

When Mickey dials the phone number Lip messages him, he is greeted by a preset voicemail, so he leaves a time, a place, and a name. _Mickey Milkovich_ , loud and clear. _The one who fucked you up outside the restaurant._

He doesn’t even know whether the message goes through, or if Lishman would willingly give him the time of day, but still, Mickey waits, and his patience does not go unrewarded.

When Ned arrives, he is in his clean, professional-looking scrubs, so damn respectable, and the people in the park look at him like they’re sharing breathing space with the city’s Citizen of the Year. The light sweater he wears is the only evidence he is still of average humanity—when the wind blows as it does in a city like Chicago, he still feels cold. He still eats to survive. He still shits, probably.

Mickey stands up from where he’s seated on the grass. He lets his fingers curl open, undoing the fists his hands unconsciously make. Ned watches him struggle against his own devices, witnesses him unfurl beneath his own skin.

“Fuckin’ do it.” Mickey says quietly.

Ned punches him square in the jaw, and it immediately makes him spit blood. The next two he gets knocks him down onto his knees. The fifth one makes him want to apologize to all the gay kids he has ever kicked to the ground.

_No fag bashing._

Well, sorry, Lip.

  
  
  
  


Mickey, unexpectedly, snickers.

The grass is cool to the touch, and so is the wind that soothes his beaten face. Ned gives him a sideward glance. He is amused, a corner of his lip quirked.

“What’s so funny?” he asks, lighting up a cigarette and tosses Mickey a lighter and the pack.

“They’re all looking at you like you’re an asshole.” Mickey smirks triumphantly as he motions towards the small group of bystanders huddled a good distance away from where they’re seated side by side.

Ned chuckles, wiping a sheen of sweat from his brow as Mickey wipes blood off his. “Valid reaction seeing as I completely whipped your ass.”

“I _let_ you whip my ass, you old fuck.” Mickey answers but with no real venom in his words, before he turns to him incredulously, “And jesus christ not one fucking asshole called 911?! A kid being knocked around in broad daylight, no one, really?”

Ned smirks. “You look old.”

Mickey rolls his eyes. “Fuck you.”

The wind whips right past them, spreading a small sting against their skin. Mickey closes his eyes as he flicks the lighter to life and lets it die again. The swell of his brow is too heavy and too painful to just simply blink away.

“I would have helped Ian out no matter what.” Ned says after a particularly long drag, “I didn’t need some form of revenge beating in return.”

“You could’ve just asked.”

Mickey releases a singular chuckle. “I ain’t gonna owe anybody anything.”

“I’m not gonna be doing this for you.”

“Nobody fucking asked you to.”

Mickey flicks the lighter on one last time, and releases it until the flame disappears.

“I don’t give a shit if you need my fucking kidney in return.” he says steadily. “Just help Ian.”

He tosses the lighter back.

“Please.”

Ned Lishman watches as Mickey Milkovich hauls himself up and walks away. He tries to superimpose the arrogant swagger he once observed on Mickey over the sullen heaviness that is now his shoulders. There is no fit to be made.

That night, Ned Lishman makes the calls.

The next day, Dr. Francis Burnham knocks on the Milkovich’s doors.

  
  
  
  


There are precisely twelve brochures about bipolar disorder spread out along the surface of the Milkovich dining table.

Mickey and Mandy read through every single one.

  
  
  
  


lf one alloys 25 percent of iron into 5 grams of gold, what you get is a discolored, brittle piece that is unusable in any way.

Most of the time, Mickey just lies at the space right next to Ian.

Ian doesn’t say anything, nor does he ever touch him.

So Mickey lets him have this reprieve. Instead, he lets the dip of the mattress tell Ian that he’s home from work, allows the restlessness of his limbs to complain just how much today’s shift wrung his muscles out. The smell of coffee wafting from the kitchen is to gently remind Ian that Mickey has a few minutes before he has to head out for his night hours.

He walks around the bed, and for the first time in a long time, allows himself to look at Ian’s face. He gets down on a knee and props an arm onto it.

“I’ll be back tomorrow morning.”

He gingerly reaches out to touch Ian’s hair, and when he does, Ian cringes. ( _lf one alloys 25 percent of iron into 5 grams of gold—_ )

He steps out into a harsh, cold night, walking against the push of wintry air.

Mickey breathes and tells himself not to fucking cry.

  
  
  


 

“I’m not sick.” Ian mutters under his breath, shaking his head.

Mickey shifts the orange bottles within his palms, and the pills inside skitter against each other.

“I’m not taking those. I’m not sick.”

“I’m not Monica.” Ian says, voice rising like an eagre bearing over the shore, “I’m not gonna end up like her.”

“I’m not gonna,” he takes a sharp breath, pressing his lips together, visibly pushing back the urge to cry, “I’m not gonna—”

Mickey looks at Ian softly, and he nods. “I know.”

Ian runs his fingers through his hair, his hands quivering in distress.

“I ain’t gonna let you.”

Mickey walks out of the room, and every single Gallagher looks at him expectantly. He shrugs, shaking his head slightly. “He won’t take them.”

“Shit,” Fiona says unbelievingly.

“You think I didn’t fucking try?” Mickey snaps back.

“Not hard enough, maybe—”

Mickey feels anger rise from his gut and snake it’s way up his chest. He doesn’t even wait until the force of it all permeates his words before he shakily hisses back, “Fuck you— _fuck the hell out of you_ , I’ve done every fucking thing I can for him that I’m running out of ways to make things work—I don’t fucking know what to do—”

Mickey digs the back of his hand against his mouth, something so close to a sob quivering in his chest,

“Mickey,” Fiona says, worry furrowing her brow.

“You think I don't know I fucking I caused this,” he breathes out through gritted teeth, “I fucking broke him—”

“ _Mickey._ ” Fiona finally presses on firmly, hands reaching out to him placatingly, “I didn’t mean it like that.”

Air passes through Mickey’s mouth like his lungs have been deprived of it for too long, and it’s Fiona’s fingers finally gripping his shoulders that topples the rickety tower he has built upon himself. They all look at him softly because no one has ever seen a Milkovich cry.

Mickey couldn’t blame them. He only ever realized not so long ago that iron could be so brittle.

“Lip will talk to Ian.” Fiona says, and with a look at his direction, Lip does a small salute and pads towards Ian's room. “He has his ways.”

“I’ll cook dinner.” Debbie says like nothing’s ever happened, and Mandy walks with her to the kitchen to pull pots and pans out of the messy cupboards.

“Diapers?” Carl asks, and Fiona motions towards the couch where a baby bag is packed. “Come on Liam, you smell like shit.”

Mickey watches as the entire house moves into motion. He wipes his eyes with the heels of his palms. He feels like the world has tilted back onto its proper axis while he's still out of balance.

“Come on.” Fiona tells him, “We’re making a schedule for Ian’s meds.”

Mickey settles into the uncomfortability of their living room couch, sniffs as he gathers all the orange bottles closer into the table.

“No more of this self-blaming shit.” She says as she flips the notebook onto a clean page.

Every Milkovich is iron.

Mickey realizes every Gallagher is gold.

  
  
  
  


It’s the word of mouth within the south side neighborhoods of Chicago.

If Mickey Milkovich comes to you for lithium pills, you better have them, and you better have them clean.

Don’t ask what he needs it for.

And don’t ask about Ian Gallagher.

  
  
  
  


Something shatters, and Mickey runs, and he scared shitless.

He stumbles into the room and sees broken pieces of glass, orange juice seeping across the wooden floor, porridge splattered in globs everywhere. Debbie stands terrified in a corner, face crumpled with hurt as she tries to settle the tears in her eyes.

Ian is crying angrily, hand tightly clutched over his mouth.

“Debs,” he grits between sobs, “ _Debs, I’m sorry,_ ”

Debbie runs across the room and throws her arms around Ian’s neck. She sobs on his shoulder, brokenly and noisily, because she’s a child—she’s just a child. Ian embraces her closely, letting his apology seep through his baby sister’s skin.

Mickey’s heart clobbers against his ribs, his lungs burning like his chest is on fire, and he has to plant a hand onto the door frame to steady himself. When he finally allows himself to move, he does so to pick up all the shards of glass he finds. He cleans the mess wordlessly afterwards.

That morning, when Mickey brings him his medication, Ian downs every single one.

Ian only ever looks at him, but there is gratitude in his eyes.

Mickey takes all he can get.

  
  
  


 

It’s one pill three times a day, but it’s progress.

Mickey Milkovich sees gold return in little specks within Ian Gallagher.

When he returns from a gruelling night shift, he collapses on the bed and slings an arm over his eyes.

“ _Morning._ ”

It’s weak sounding and gravelly, so much so that Mickey thinks he probably just conjured the sound out of the desperation of wanting to hear it so bad, but when he lifts his arm and opens his eyes, Ian’s gazing at him like he'ss the first sunrise he’d seen in the longest of times.

Ian is tired, but he smiles.

“ _Fuck,_ ” Mickey doesn’t mean to whisper, but he does, chuckling softly under his breath, “ _Yeah, good morning_.”

  
  


 

One day, Ian greets him with an apology. The space in between them is still starkly there, but the words make it so that it diminishes minutely.

“I’m sorry, Mick.”

Mickey doesn’t turn around for the sake of his own sanity.

“For what?”

He could feel the words and the desperation and the sorrow ripple his skin.

“For all this shit.” Ian says, his sentences broken apart struggling breaths, “You didn’t sign up for this. You don’t fucking deserve this.”

Mickey let’s his shoulder fall against the surface of the bed, his back flush against the mattress. He notices the awful pattern that fills the ceiling.

“Ian,” he says steadily, “I’ve thrown my life to shit from day one. Been to juvie seven times, family’s fucked up in ten different ways. I’ve got an asshole father who’d rather have me dead than gay.”

“You’re the only happy thing in my life.”

“For all the shit life’s put me through,” Mickey’s eyes flutter close for a moment before they open again, “I fucking deserve you.”

“Don’t you tell me I don’t.”

When Mickey finally looks to his side, Ian is trying not to cry. He decimates the space in between and presses himself against Mickey, arms soft around his waist, legs tangled in a familiar heap. Mickey turns to his side and finally holds him tight—and he feels submerged under ocean waves and bound onto the shore.

He breathes.

“Fuck. You’ve gone soft, Milkovich.” Ian chuckles, pressing his lips against Mickey’s eyes.

Mickey quirks a corner of his lip into a smirk. “Your fucking fault, Gallagher.”

  
  
  
  


The day is Monday, the time seven thirty in the morning.

Ian Gallagher steps onto the front porch and into the open doors of his house. It takes everybody two minutes to hear his footsteps from the living room. Mickey shrugs off his jacket and leans by the door frame.

“Hey.” he says, the smile on his lips flickering like he’s nervous.

Fiona is breathless when she answers. “Ian,”

Carl is the first to move; he runs to him and clings to his clothes like reality is a vague thing that needs to be tested. Ian holds him tightly, one hand ruffling his hair. He sniffs as he jokingly flicks Carl on the forehead. “I’m still gonna do a head count on my training knives, you little shit.”

“About fucking time, man.” Lip grins and then him and Debbie pile on and they’re just a big tangle of tightly wound arms and glistening eyes, and Ian never quite forgot how good the warmth feels. Liam clumsily reaches out for him from his chair,  so Ian untangles himself from everybody and swoops down to give him a kiss on the  forehead. “Missed ‘ya, buddy.”

“Okay everybody, breakfast, quickly!” Fiona calls, setting everyone in motion. She points a spatula towards Ian’s direction, “You’ve got two weeks of chores to catch up on, mister.” she grins.

Ian rolls his eyes, chuckling. “Wow, okay, didn’t know bipolar disorder wasn’t a valid excuse.”

Fiona laughs, shoving him on the shoulder. “Oh, you’re playing that card? Really?”

“Fuck yeah I’m playing that card, this shitty condition has to be good for _something_.”

“Shit, fine.” Fiona whips her head towards Mickey’s direction and calls, “Milkovich, dishes!”

Mickey looks at her incredulously. “Why the fuck?”

Fiona piles some pancakes on a plate and holds it out for him to take. “If you’re staying for breakfast, you gotta pay up one way or another.”

Ian is scarfing down the last bits of his food and Mickey is mumbling darkly under his breath when Fiona bumps hips with him by the sink. She doesn’t say anything beyond the grateful smile she gives him. He flicks the faucet open.

“Fuck you for this manual labor.” he scowls.

He grabs the first plate and rinses.

  
  
  
  


Mickey Milkovich is iron.

 

( _"Up up up."_ )

( _"Mick, dammit.."_ )

 

Ian Gallagher is gold.

 

( _"What's that, mumbles?"_ )

( _A soft chuckle. "Jesus christ, leave me alone."_ )

( _Mickey smiles. "Come on."_ )

( _Ian breathes and takes Mickey's hand.)_

 

Together, they exist.

**Author's Note:**

> "The streets you’re walking on—a thousand houses long—well that’s where I belong, and you belong with me, not swallowed in the sea." (Swallowed in the Sea, Coldplay)
> 
> houseangelos.co.vu (tumblr ; U ;)


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